Marion Le Pen, Marine's niece on course to win French seat

Marion Maréchal-Le Pen, Jean Marie Le Pen's granddaughter is on course to win a seat in the French parliament after her Socialist rival defied party orders to withdraw in favour of a mainstream Right candidate.

Marion Le Pen insists that she was not brought up ready-formatted as a Front National (FN) politician. Photo: Getty

By Henry Samuel in Paris

3:12PM BST 15 Jun 2012

The 22-year old law student is one of five far-Right candidates in with a chance of becoming an MP in Sunday's final round of legislative elections, in which the Socialists stand to win a majority. The National Front has failed to win and keep a seat in the National Assembly since 1986.

The third generation of France's far-Right dynasty, Miss Maréchal-Le Pen came top in the first round in the southeastern Vaucluse department, leading her xenophobic grandfather to say it proved she came from "good stock".

She said she chose the Provençal constituency whose main town is Carpentras to avenge her grandfather's "soiled" name.

In 1990, National Front supporters were accused of desecrating a Jewish cemetery in Carpentras, which Mr Le Pen always denied.

Her aunt Marine Le Pen, leader of the anti-immigration, anti-Europe party, won an even higher slice of the vote in the first round of legislative elections, taking 42 per cent in her constituency of Hénin Beaumont in the northern Pas de Calais. But her telegenic niece stands the higher chance of being elected on Sunday.

But in Carpentras, third-placed Socialist candidate Catherine Arkilovitch is refusing to following party orders to bow out to allow second-placed Right-wing UMP candidate Jean-Michel Ferrand to block the FN candidate's rise.

Adamant that every effort must be made to stop an "an emblematic personality getting a foothold in the department", the Socialist Party has piled on the pressure to get Miss Arkilovitch to stand down, to no avail.

With the vote split three ways, a BVA poll forecasts Miss Maréchal-Le Pen will win with 36.5 per cent of the vote, ahead of her UMP and Socialist rivals, on 34.5 per cent and 29 per cent, making her France's youngest MP.

The Socialist Party has proposed withdrawing its candidates from second-round races where others have a better chance of beating the Front National and called on the UMP to do the same.

UMP leader Jean-François Copé has rejected allying with the National Front, even though one poll found two-thirds of UMP voters back the idea to defeat the Left. There was embarrassment for the UMP yesterday, however, when former high-profile minister Nadine Morano was recorded praising a "talented" Marine Le Pen in a phone call with a comedian pretending to be the FN party number two.

Two polls on Friday suggested President François Hollande's Socialists will win outright control of parliament on Sunday, securing more than the 289 seats required without recourse to support from the Eurosceptic far-Left or their Green allies. A parliamentary majority would strengthen Mr Hollande's hand in pushing for more growth measures in Europe amid rising tensions with Germany over its austerity stance.

The ballot in France risks being overshadowed on Sunday by a general election in Greece that some see as make or break for the future of the euro zone.